Medical scandal United Kingdom | The UK Labour government has put an indefinite ban on any new routine prescribing of puberty blockers for gender-distressed young people.¹ On Wednesday, Health Secretary Wes Streeting, who had twice extended the emergency ban imposed by the former Conservative administration, said it was “a scandal that [puberty blocking] medicine was given to vulnerable young children without the proof that it is safe or effective or [without going] through the rigorous safeguards of a clinical trial.”

He said the ban would “restrict the sale or supply of puberty blockers to under-18s through a prescription issued by either a private UK prescriber or a prescriber registered outside the UK.” The ban is to be reviewed in 2027. (In March this year, England’s National Health Service announced an end to routine use of puberty blockers in the public system, apart from a possible clinical trial.)

Helen Joyce of the group Sex Matters welcomed Mr Streeting’s decision, and said: “It marks another step towards puberty blockers being relegated to a shameful chapter of history, in which parents and health professionals were emotionally blackmailed into harming children in the name of ‘progress’.”

Also on Twitter, Georgia Meadows, national trans officer for LGBT+Labour, said: “I cannot hope to describe the depth of depression this policy will cause. People will consider suicide, I already am. Many will attempt it.”²

Yesterday, Baroness Hilary Cass, who led the world’s most comprehensive review of care for gender-distressed youth, said those criticising the ban as “discrimination” misunderstood medical evidence. “What is worrying is when people say that if children don’t get these drugs, they will die, because clearly that’s not true,” she told The Times. She said it was “irresponsible for people to shroud-wave in that way.”

In the House of Commons, Mr Streeting cited advice from the Commission on Human Medicines that the supply of public blockers would represent “an unacceptable safety risk” at the moment. He said the commission had “found that children had received prescriptions after filling out online questionnaires and having one brief zoom call with prescribers from outside the UK.”

Earlier this month, the online clinic GenderGP, founded by British physician Dr Helen Webberley, was warned to stop the unlicensed provision of outpatient medical services to people in Singapore, where the business is based.

Video: Health Secretary Streeting addresses the UK House of Commons on puberty blockers